School Responsibilities

Put me in the group who thinks this is a great idea. I taught my kids this at home, but I know it's not something every kid is taught at home.

On colleges, I know people tend to think of big-name universities as being unnecessary, but that's not always true. It depends on your goal. A lot of bigger schools have some amazing alumni organizations. Take Rice, for instance. If you graduate from Rice, and you're unemployed, you just don't want to work because the Rice "network" is incredible. Same with Texas A&M.

None of my kids have attended big-name schools, and I'm glad. However, my son that is graduating this year has been accepted into a top 30 school in his chosen major that also has an amazing alumni network in that field. It's worth it to me to bite the bullet on letting him go there because it's going to make his path out of school so much easier and he'll have tremendous support and contacts that he wouldn't get out of most schools.

You just have to weigh the cost-benefit like in everything else.